Sprint Novatel U720 Review

Well my Sprint Novatel USB Ovation U720 arrived yesterday and after three tries with Sprint was able to get the ESN from my old card swapped to this new one. Overall the performance is great but I was surprised to see that the you have to use a Dual USB Port Dongle with the unit. Thus running the device on your laptop requires the utilisation of two USB ports.

The antenna access for the device is under the flip-up antenna and I am already concerned about the longevity of the card as looking down into the antenna port hole I do not see a lot of supporting material in and around the connection. Only time will tell if the external port will hold up or not.

This card is Rev A. capable but seeing Hawaii does not get Rev A. till the first of the year I will not be able to report on speeds. In download speed test the unit is comparable in transfer speeds of the PCMCIA version of this card.

I think the folks at Novatel would have been smart of they would have provided a power port for the USB card so as to allowed those that were using it in a permanent location to not have to use two USB ports to run the device.

I paid full retail for this card as I had existing service so I am hoping that in the long run this card works out ok. Meanwhile I have a Sprint PC-5740 card for sale if anyone wants to purchase it.

Update: The Novatel U720 does work with the Kyocera KR-1, I was concerned about this, but my testing here validates the KR1 works with the U720!

Comments

Todd, I’ve been using the U720 for a while now and have never had to plug in both USB connections into my laptop. One connection works just fine. I believe the other connection is in case you want to hook up a 2nd computer at the same time.
If you needed to hook up both USB connections to make the U720 work, how come mine works fine with only 1 USB connection plugged in?
-Bryant

The U720 does work with the KR1 Router, but it’s not officially supported. You will not see Rev A speeds out the router. The only Rev A card that is supported in KR1 is Sprint’s S720. I would not be surprised if the U720 is supported soon, because Verizon’s version of the U720 called the USB720 is coming out soon. You can still get the U720 for free at http://moremobileinternet.com/free-u720

Kyocera will soon be announcing firmware RK1010 that provides full support for the U720/USB720 as well as the PX500/PC5750.
As with prior firmware releases, EVDOinfo.com and 3GStore.com are first to sell KR1 routers with this new firmware! …for more info, read:http://www.evdoinfo.com/content/view/1973/64/